


(though I have to travel far)

by Deeambles



Series: Keep our love alive, I'll never fade away [2]
Category: Coco (2017), Naruto
Genre: Naruto with Coco themes, tsunade reflects basically
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-25
Packaged: 2020-05-19 15:17:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19359571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deeambles/pseuds/Deeambles
Summary: Tsunade spends some time reflecting on her life and choices, and hopes her ancestors don't look down to harshly on her for it.





	(though I have to travel far)

Tsunade remembers some of the earliest moments she ever celebrated Día de los Muertos. She was 5 maybe, or 6, the typical age people start remembering bits and pieces of their childhood.

She remembers the fine grain of sugar that would stick to her finger tips when putting out the sugar sculls.

She remembers all the flowers and candles and lights they hung around the ofrendas. Different tiers for different people, or sometimes it was simply one person and their staircase from earth to heaven.

She was 8 when Hashirama passed away. It was the first year that she remembered Mito spending more time on the altar than ever. Tsunade had picked out a green scull with flowers for his alter. He was always giving some to her, but she also thinks the green is good to represent all the money he spent gambling. It was also the first year that she realized that the Senju as a whole did not traditionally celebrate the day of the dead, and she simply did not know, for Tsunade always went to Uzushio to celebrate.

“Obaasan?”

“Yes, Tsunade?”

In Tsunade’s head, Mito’s voice was, and always will be, as smooth and deep as the swirling whirlpools around Uzushio.

“Why are we putting the altar in front of the Hokage tower instead of in front of Grandpas house or grave?”

Mito looked up from where she was fixing Marigolds around his portrait. Tsunade doesn’t think it does him justice, the picture that is. He looks too stern, like how he does on the mountain.

“Your grandfather was the Hokage. When people come to pay their respects, they will come to the tower.”

“But why not his home. Where he lived, instead of worked, or the grave sites, with everyone else?”

Mito’s smiles were rare ever since Hashirama’s body was found among warped roots, and poisonous gas,—

(If it were any other situation, maybe he would of healed himself, but he covered the retreat, and then collapsed from the gas.

With Tobriama half way across the world on another mission, there was nobody strong enough to find him.

Later, much later, when Tsunade would look at Hashirama’s Autopsy report, the medic made a comment that considering the damage written on previous medical exams, he should of been able to recover, if not for the fact that someone slit his throat.

Tsunade vowed then and there that there would always be a medic on the squads sent out. That nobody would ever get left behind to the mercy of a bunch of cowards who could only strike a man when he was already down and unconscious.

It at least, was a painless death.)

—But she favored one to Tsunade when she asked. All soft curves, and kind lines. The diamond on her forehead rising ever so slightly when her eyebrows drew the smallest centimeter together.

It was a true smile.

“He would have liked that, little princess, but not everyone in the Senju clan celebrates like we do on Uzushio, nor are we the only one in Konoha who do. This will give all who celebrate here a chance to welcome him over the petal bridge.” 

“Oh!” Tsunade had exclaimed then, nearly missing that Mito implied her family did not celebrate what she had always assumed everyone did, “We have to lay the Petals out, Grandma! Or else he can’t cross!”

Mito had laughed then at her granddaughter’s diligence to tradition, turning her along towards the market place.

“You have a good heart Tsunade. I hope you never forget it. Now come, we can go get some more petals.”

Tsunade, in all her 8-year-old wisdom simply looked up confused at her grandmother.

“Why would I forget I have a heart, baasan? It’s in my chest, I can feel it.”

She didn’t understand till years later what Mito, and Tobirama who was coming out of the Hokage tower, found so funny.

/.../

Tsunade lets the sake settle in her cup before looking over at Shizune, tucked into a bedroll in the dinky motel they found to stay in for the night.

The last time she celebrated was after Dan’s death. That year had been joyless. So many pictures added to alters, and the war raged harder than ever. It was a relief really. A day they could forget and simply honor those who came before.

When Nawaki had passed, and the war eventually came to an end. She couldn’t even bring herself to look at the rich golden marigolds.

Couldn’t bring herself to travel to Uzushio, or even to the Uchiha compound where Hikaku said she was welcome to anytime.

The previous Kage would be set up by the old Team Tobirama, and Mito would be put up by her family.

She just…couldn’t do it herself.

The night before Dia de los Muertos, she packed up her things and took Dan’s niece and fled.

Not one of her most proudest moments, but Konoha became something she couldn’t stand to live in anymore. She would have been expected to run the hospital, expected to see blood and not see Dan’s body beneath her, or Nawaki’s stained clothes under a pale sheet.

She would have been needed on the front lines for post-war clean up.

And she just couldn’t do it.

Shizune understood. And that’s all the people Tsunade has ever cared about wanting to understand, but.

She thinks Mito would get it. Hashirama was forgiving and Tobirama was dutiful, but Mito lived to be the last of her generation, hundreds of miles from her home between the whirlpools, with no one cfrom her home island left besides one little girl who came to be a sacrifice.

Yes, Tsunade thinks, Mito would have understood.

It makes her feel bad actually. With Uzushio’s fall, there’s nobody to light any candles or lay out any paths. She wonders if Kushina, some vague relative of hers, ever did one in her time at Konoha.

Probably, it was still a tradition. One that the Uchiha and several other clans followed every year. Supposedly she married the yondaime too, for his short reign as Hokage.

Tsunade thinks that position is as cursed as her necklace, and she can’t help the way her stomach clenches, not because of the sake, or even the shitty motel food she ate, but grief.

She has no idea if her ancestors really cross, but she hopes where ever they are they forgive her when she follows them. They should have an open gate, and yet she can’t bring herself to go find a sugar scull or even some painted Marigolds. She has no pictures anyways and she can’t stand the thought of going back to the main Senju household to find some.

The tears that roll down her face are as salty as the sugar is sweet. It too, makes her fingers sticky as she quietly allows herself to grieve after all these years.

**Author's Note:**

> its been 7 months since I added to this series, and then out of nowhere I wrote two little stories for it lol, when inspiration hits amirite?


End file.
